Pakistan, EU to sign 100-mln-euro cooperation agreement

ISLAMABAD, Feb. 14 (Xinhua) -- The European Union (EU) will sign a cooperation agreement with Pakistan of 100 million euro credit for a power project in the country, the EU office in Islamabad said on Friday.

Vice President of the European Investment Bank (EIB) Magdalena Alverez Arza will visit Pakistan on February 15-18 and sign the agreement.

The EIB will provide the money for the 128 MW Keyal Khwar Hydropower Project in Pakistan's Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province.

The Keyal Khwar Project in Dasu district is scheduled to be completed in four years and will provide 418 million units of low- cost hydel electricity to the national grid and support the deployment of renewable energy in Pakistan. It will also benefit local residents through improved transportation and employment opportunities.

The project is supported by EIB in cooperation with the German Development Bank (KfW) and the Pakistan Water and Power Development Authority (Wapda).

The EIB and the KfW are providing 100 million euro and 97 million euro respectively for construction of the hydropower project, whose total cost is 240 million euro, a statement from the EU office in Islamabad said.

This is the fifth project supported by the EIB in Pakistan. Since the start of lending in Asia in 1993, the EIB has provided more than 5.1 billion euro for long-term investment projects, including 2.4 billion in the energy sector.